Well, no matter. It's the day when we find a rock, carefully turn it over, and photograph the organisms we find living underneath it. Rock-flipping day is a simple biodiversity exercise designed to give us an excuse to peep on our lesser-seen local wildlife. For those inclined to share their discoveries, Flickr has a Rock-Flipping Day photo pool.

Treasure #4: An ant cricket (Myrmecophilus pergandei) living among the ants.

The cricket hides away.

Treasure #5: A young woodlouse runs for cover.

The views expressed are those of the author(s) and are not necessarily those of Scientific American.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR(S)

Alex Wild

Alex Wild is Curator of Entomology at the University of Texas at Austin, where he studies the evolutionary history of ants. In 2003 he founded a photography business as an aesthetic complement to his scientific work, and his natural history photographs appear in numerous museums, books and media outlets.

Scientific American is part of Springer Nature, which owns or has commercial relations with thousands of scientific publications (many of them can be found at www.springernature.com/us). Scientific American maintains a strict policy of editorial independence in reporting developments in science to our readers.